Criticism on Patents

As state-granted monopolies, patents have been criticized as inconsistent with free trade. On that basis, in 1869 the Netherlands abolished patents, and did not reintroduce them until 1912.[32]

Patents have also been criticized for being granted on already-known inventions, with many complaining in the United States that the USPTO fails "to do a serious job of examining patents, thus allowing bad patents to slip through the system."[16] On the other hand, it has been argued that because of low number of patents going into litigation, increasing quality of patents at patent prosecution stage will increase overall legal costs associated with patents, and that current USPTO policy is a reasonable compromise between full trial on examination stage on one hand, and pure registration without examination, on the other hand. [16]

Patent trolls are one of common criticisms against patents [33], though some commentators suggest that patent trolls are not bad for the patent system at all but instead realign market participant incentives, make patents more liquid, and clear the patent market.[34]

Pharmaceutical patents prevent generic alternatives to enter the market until the patents expire, and thus maintains high prices for medication.[35] This can have significant effects in the developing world, as those who are most in need of basic essential medicines are unable to afford such high priced pharmaceuticals.[36] Critics also question the rationale that exclusive patent rights and the resulting high prices are required for pharmaceutical companies to recoup the large investments needed for research and development.[35] One study concluded that marketing expenditures for new drugs often doubled the amount that was allocated for research and development.[37] Other articles shed light on the problems of today's medical research. It sets wrong priorities in research and pricing, and pushes the state-run healthcare systems even of rich nations to their limits.[38]

In one response to these criticisms, one review concluded that less than 5 percent of medicines on the World Health Organization's list of essential drugs are under patent.[39] Also, the pharmaceutical industry has contributed US$2 billion for healthcare in developing countries, providing HIV/AIDS drugs at lower cost or even free of charge in certain countries, and has used differential pricing and parallel imports to provide medication to the poor.[39] Other groups are investigating how social inclusion and equitable distribution of research and development findings can be obtained within the existing intellectual property framework, although these efforts have received less exposure.[39]

Some public campaigns have expressed a concern for "preventing the over-reach" of IP protection including patent protection, and "to retain a public balance in property rights" of this kind.[40]